


To be me again

by NellB0_0



Series: If you can't get rid of the skeletons in your closet, teach them to dance [4]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Mention of KingDings, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Undertale Pacifist Route, Racism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:15:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24547483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NellB0_0/pseuds/NellB0_0
Summary: Everything was cool now. Monsters were out of the Underground, Paps was happy with his new bright red car and was becoming very popular now, eccentricities and all. The Surface was good for his brother, to Sans on the other hand… Well, existential crisis is putting it mildly.ORThe monsters are out and about, the Anti-Monster organization was full of pricks, Alphys goes back to sciency things and Gaster just discovered a new way to mess with the timeline. It just happens to be all tied together. Fun.
Series: If you can't get rid of the skeletons in your closet, teach them to dance [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1218168
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	To be me again

**I want to know what is like to breath, to keep going, to be determined. I want to feel love. I want to feel alive.**

* * *

The sight of the sun came as a surprise at first. Not because no one had seen it before, especially him, but it felt different this time somehow. The red hues mixing with beautiful orange as that deep dark blue kept claiming territory in the night sky was something, alright.

He felt himself tremble slightly at the sight, his breath taken away once more. He knew it didn’t really matter in the end, that it could all be taken in the blink of an eye without him even realizing what was happening. The Surface wasn’t particularly appealing either, and yet… Yeah, seeing the sun for the first time after all of your life being imprisoned Underground would do that to a monster, he muses, unconsciously losing that tension that always kept him aware of everything going on around him.

Sans wasn’t someone that let things get to him, or that was what he told to himself, but he couldn’t help but feel the sting of metal in his ribcage slightly less as time passed, everyone admiring the sight. A promise, a new beginning for a whole race of people. It was amazing, it was inspiring, it was terrifying, but if Frisk could be nice, so could everyone else.

Yeah, nice. Sans shivered.

Everyone was thinking about the future, what would they do now that they were free. It was something he himself had doubts about. What was he going to do now? Should he even bother? Or should he just mysteriously disappear and be out of everyone’s lives? Possibilities were really endless in the Surface.

When everyone started talking, he didn’t bother to listen, he got the gist of what was being talked about and, even if he didn’t know every word, he knew his lines perfectly well.

The kiddo accepted the ambassador position this time. Huh, that means this timeline was going to be a bit longer that if they said no. Fun.

Once Papyrus went running, he excused himself, not really caring what he said and entering the mountain once more. He would take a shortcut to them later, when the mess that was the first interaction with humans was over. Sans didn’t want to deal with that and with his low health he didn’t want there to be an accident that hindered the peace he knew could be achieved.

He would find out later if the kid decided to stay with Toriel or not. Honestly, no matter what they did, he hoped they’d stay with the old lady. It was always better for everyone, happier and she wasn’t as lonely.

Granted, everything could go to shit in a hand-basket all that much sooner, but it was better that way.

For now, though, he would go tie some loose ends. There was a certain flower goat child that needed to be addressed and he wasn’t going to say no, someone had to after all, may as well be him.

To deal with Flowey again it is.

* * *

The sun was shining in the little patch of blooming yellow flowers, a lonely goat child looking longingly and sad at the light, his clawed feet slowly turning back to roots and changing him back into a flower.

“heya.”

Asriel startled, the soft and dragging sound of Sans’ slippers impossible to not be addressed now that he was aware the other was here, again.

“Howdy.”

It always went this way, Asriel mused. Just as he was being transformed into a flower, the skeleton would come around to talk to him. It always used to surprise him but now it was part of his routine. Honestly, he almost preferred when neither of them remembered True Resets, but here they both are. There was no ‘True’ anymore in the Reset, but they kept the pretense. It was always better that way for both of them.

The silence dragged on.

“You know, you don’t have to keep doing this.”

“i know.”

Asriel’s red eyes stared deep into the darkness that were Sans’ eye-sockets.

“It’s better for everyone if I’m here, you know that if we change things, Frisk…”

Sans grunted. The child had a point, but Asriel almost wished he didn’t. It was selfish, but…

“Could you…” Ariel fidgeted with his hands, nervous for reasons he would never be able to properly express. “Could you tell my parents to live happy this time too?”

Sans’ eye-lights reappeared, softening in a way that made the non-existent soul of Asriel feel… something. He wasn’t good with his emotions anymore, didn’t know how to differentiate between them, but if he had to give it a name, it would be bittersweet.

“of course, kid.”

Asriel inhaled deep, smelling the flowers as his transformation reached his knees now, all brown and woody.

“You know, the first time I woke up as a flower, I was scared.” He looked to that crevice of the Surface, wishing and hoping and despairing all at once because he knew it wasn’t possible, knew it wasn’t fair, but-

“When I first came to myself, it was to the sight of my dad, Asgore, watering a patch of golden flowers like those of Chara’s village. I didn’t understand it then, but without Chara’s body, Chara’s grave” he was all too conscious of where his roots were now, the body of his sibling just beneath “that was all he had, his own way to grieve and to remember us. I get it now, but it was a long time before I could.”

Asriel directed his eyes to Sans’ again, tears in his eyes refusing to get out.

“At first, the familiar sight of my dad was enough, but soon there was a problem. I couldn’t feel happy to see him. As Chara said, I really am a crybaby” Asriel sobbed. “That was just the beginning, though. I tried really hard to do good, really, but all I could feel were negative emotions and even that was a stretch. It was muted, somehow.”

He watched as Sans sighed, letting him talk. The rests of soul essence from all the Underground plus the six humans souls slowly flowing away from him. He wanted to finish this before that happened.

“I tripped Monster Kid once, never really remembered his name to be honest, maybe it really was Kidd or at least that’s what I’ve been calling him. Anyways, I said sorry afterwards and it was just that, but I couldn’t feel remorse.” Asriel cried even harder, his sight blurring. “I can feel negative emotions, but I couldn’t feel the most important of them and I knew, in that moment, that I could never grieve for Chara properly now, that… that no matter what I did, it would only serve as a past-time.”

Asriel hiccuped, trying with his furry paws to get rid of the tears. He failed and he couldn’t feel his legs anymore, this transformation was going to fast and he was going to become Flowey again and ohgodhewasn’tready-

“what happened, then?”

“Huh? Oh, right.” Controlling his panic for now, Asriel kept going. “The first time I died as a flower, it was an accident, something to do with salt or something, I don’t remember it well. But then I woke up again in that patch of flowers, my dad watering them and I broke down crying again. And again and again and again. No matter what I did, I couldn’t really die.”

Sans seemed taller now, Asriel was slowly descending into the earth, his roots going under the ground to join his buried sibling.

“For what is worth, I’m sorry for all the trouble I gave you and… Papyrus really is something haha.”

“yeah, my bro’s cool.”

Asriel didn’t feel neither his hands nor his arms.

Sans sat down in front of him, the silence still present between them, but it felt nice. It was like a blanket, comforting, because what else could it be when you were with the one person that has seen everything you could ever do, the person that has been there since the beginning but comfort?

It was twisted in a sense, Asriel mused, but he would take what he could. Which, thinking about it, it wasn’t that much. Huh.

“He is more than cool. You know, if I wasn’t soulless, if I could feel freely, then, I would like to be his friend again.”

Sans laughed.

“kid, you don’t stop being someone’s friend just because, my bro is cool and, in what me respects” Sans leaned down, approaching the goat flower child “you are our friend, psycopathic tendencies or whatever. I mean, have you seen undyne?”

And Asriel didn’t even notice he was completely buried in the earth, only his face present in the mocking presence of the flower appearance. He had the tears under control, he swore, but-

He couldn’t help it, he laughed. The sound of it filling the cavern. It sounded watery.

“and i mean it.”

He looked as the skeleton withdrew an item from his inventory, a glowing syringe. His breath hitched, his heart skipped a beat.

“there’s no guarantee that the kid won’t reset this time, but i collected some soul essence. Apparently, some of the humans you absorbed ended up liking you, so the choice is up to you. it won’t make you feel like if you had a soul, it will be muted, but…”

But it was better than being soulless. Than only feeling negative emotions.

It was better than the possibility of never feeling love again.

Love, not L.O.V.E.

“YES!”

And there was that.

* * *

The crunching of leaves alerted them of his presence.

“OH, BROTHER, WHERE WERE YOU? I JUST FINISHED TALKING TO THIS NICE HUMAN LADY! APPARENTLY WE ARE GOING TO SOME CENTER WHILE LADY ASGORE AND THE HUMAN GET EVERYTHING SORTED OUT. IT WILL BE LIKE A GIANT SLEEPOVER WITH EVERYONE NYEHEHEHEHEH!”

Sans shrugged, his eyes crinkling in a way that meant his usual smile was just a tad bit more genuine this time.

“really? that’s nice bro.”

“I KNOW, RIGHT?”

Papyrus beamed, his arms going in all directions while he talked. The human lady, a government worker or something related if Sans had to guess, looked like she was gonna faint. It was hilarious.

“Hey punk! You’re late!” Undyne smiled wide, all violent excitement while there were three humans or so trying to subdue her and failing. Badly.

“H-h-hey Sans. G-glad you-u could m-ma-make it.” Alphys was nervous as always, discreetly ogling how her girlfriend bench-pressed all three humans at once. Never change, Alph.

“We were almost worried you had gotten lost, my friend.” Toriel’s ( ~~and wasn’t that a doozy each and every time he had to pretend to relearn her name~~ ) smile was full of warmth and a glint of mischief.

“YES BROTHER, WHERE WERE YOU?”

Sans chuckled, amused.

“Y’know, around.”

* * *

In his patch of flowers, Flowey was crying while smiling.

“Thank you.”

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language, so any mistakes you notice please let me know in the comments.


End file.
